Students spread word: 'Bullying is Bull'

Updated 12:05 am, Saturday, October 19, 2013

BRIDGEPORT -- Bullies were sung about, rapped about and spoken about at a recent community forum and education expo hosted for parents and students at Luis Munoz Marin School.

"We have to stop it; the only way to stop it is to be aware of it," Tyrone Dunmore, of Connecticut Against Violence, told students sitting with legs criss-crossed in front of the school's auditorium stage Thursday.

Before he left the stage, Dunmore had the students, whose school includes pre-kindergarten through eighth grade, chanting "Bullying is Bull" and winning prizes for saying who they'd tell if bullied.

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Tips for battling bullying:

1. Talk with and listen to your kids. Children comfortable with talking to parents are more likely to seek their help. 2. Spend time at school and recess. Volunteer in the school if possible.3. Set a good example. When angry, watch what you say.4. Coach kids to be kind and to speak up when others are not.

Tips are courtesy the National PTA, and education.com

Jessica Martinez, vice president of Marin's Parent Advisory Council, said the school decided to make bullying a focus of the expo, knowing that parents would attend. She said the idea was partly in response to the increased attention bullying has received in the wake of the recent suicide of a Greenwich High School freshman and partly because of what Martinez has witnessed in spending a great deal of time at the school this year.

"Maybe it's not worse, but the bullying is more exposed to me," she said.

Schools Superintendent Paul Vallas, who attended the program primarily to tell the school about what is going on in the district, said he knows firsthand what if feels like to be bullied.

"I was made fun of when I was a kid, and it was traumatic for me," Vallas said. "I stuttered and stammered, and kids used to threaten to beat me up, so I went to school every day terrified when I was a freshman."

He used to take a different route to school every day, he said. Eventually, he grew tall enough that his size became a deterrent.

Vallas said he is exploring the establishment of a student hot line that would be devoted just to bullying. Incidents reported would be investigated. He said he did something similar when he led the Chicago school system.

Martinez said bullying has changed from the time she was a youngster.

"These days, it starts in first grade," she said. "And now it involves the Internet and social media, which is something we never had."

Marin Principal Steven Douglas said he doesn't think there is more bullying today, but that students are more willing to discuss it.

"There is much more awareness," Douglas said. "Before, they were afraid and not wanting to communicate that someone (was) bothering them. They are much more likely to speak up and advocate for themselves."

If adults are aware of the situation, Douglas said, the bullying usually stops.

By night, Diasha "Baby D" Gillian, 12, and David "Lil Dave G" Gillian 10, are performers. By day, they are honor roll students across town at Curiale School.

"I've been bullied, but not to the point where we see all these kids killing themselves," Diasha said of bullying that amounted to name-calling and pushes in the hallway. The difference for her, she said, was having supportive parents.

Diasha and her brother said they also have seen others being bullied a bunch of times.

"I've never stepped in, but I have told a teacher or a parent," she said.